The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1887-06-14
4 sermon on Likely.

AT 81, Andrews CaIneufal SUNDAY
morning at 80 o'clock service the sermon
was preached by the Rev. Herbert H.
| Gowen, S. A. c., from the text II Tim. iii
! 2, "Lovers of their Own Selves"
The reverend gentleman said! Last let
tiers are always affecting. The tears which
| blotted them are wiped away now, but the
words speak to US with force which they
never had before.
The text is taken from st. Paul's last
letter, and the words have therefore all the
significance of words written in the imme-
date prospect of death. st. Paul predicts
that perilous times are to come, and one
mark of these perilous times is that men
will be "lovers of their own selves - The
subject is suggested by the parable
of the Rich Man and Lazarus in the Cos
pei for the day. The sin of the rich
man was not that he was rich, or that he
Jared well or dressed we'll; it was living
for self, squandering all in self pleasing
The root of bis sin was unbelief. 1t was
sin of general habit. You could not lay
your hand upon one particular as in itself
sinful: the sin was in the character and
the life. This is a very slippery sin; it
evades our grasp by its very vastness and
vagueness, and can only be dealt with in
general terms, which are so easily acqui-
esced in and so easily put on one side.
1t may be best described as living in
the things of sense, and so to escape from
the sin we see the need of belief in eter-
nal things.
The life of self-pleasing is perilouS to So
ciety and to the individual
The death stage of nations has been the
stage of luxury. 1t was so at Rome when
fortune was squandered in banquet of
peacocks' brains and nightingales' tongues,
and 10000 900 sesterces were given for
single dress. Meanwhile fostering sores
were left unnoticed at their very gates
The result came at last in revolution and
death.
It is perilOus for the individual.
How is it possible to be like-minded
with Christ, and yet that His life should
be all seIf-sacrifice, ours all pleasing?
The Gospels are ringing rebuke to a life |
of self-pleasing. Lovers of their own
selves" must be masters of a singular in /
genulty if they can discover in themselves |
resemblance to their crucifed Lord.
The cross which we bear is to be taken |
up voluntarily, and it must be a sapling of |
the tree on which Christ suffered.
A life of faith is impossible with self |
pleasing. When the senses are pampered
the eye of faith wakes dim. Faith needs |
a bracing atmosphere.
1t is an ignoble thing for man made /
for self-mastery to yield himself captive to
the petty exigencies of luxurious living
Another result is the scantiness of aims
giving. To keep up the life of self-pleasing, |
the Lazarus at the gate, yea the Christ at
the gate, is starved.
Woe to US if we tread down the holy as
pirations of sympathy and self-sacrifice,
until the heart, capable of a grand Christ
like unselishness of living and loving,
sinks to a hard, careless acquiescence with
what it secretly scorns.
The preacher then pointed out three
remedies: 1st. Self-denial The world
is not a scramble for feast, and the CHS
tian must not eagerly snatch at every
pleasure; must not attempt sailing as
near to the works as possible. The rich
man was not drunkard or a murderer,
only lover of self. And we4ee the iudg-
ment of Him who viii be the Judge of all
ID. Systematic aims giving, not merely
On good impulse, but on definite princi-
pies, and in definite proportions. as an act
Of worship.
g. Work, which is to the soul what exer-
rise is to the pampered body. Work will
quicken the circulation and promote the
ife, and assuredly one part of the reward
will be the blessedness of some far-off like
zoos 70 orr crucified Lord
The Moloch of Self to which we sacrifice
20 much must be overthrow, and then we
hall experience the true rest which no
earthly luxury can afford. the rest of Him
Who calls US from this vain world to per
eet rest in Himself